Biography
Expertise and interests include:
1) Research to improve the care of at risk and dependent alcohol and drug users in the medical setting.
2) Role of community health workers/health promotion advocates in the medical setting.
3) Reducing STI among cocaine and heroin users.
4) The role of motivational interviewing to improve the patient physician encounters/relations.
5) Health Equity related to Covid and Opioid Overdose deaths
Dr. Bernstein is Professor Emeritus of Emergency Medicine and an Uncompensated Affiliated of the Boston University School of Medicine. He had a joint appointment as Professor in the Department of Community Health Sciences, BU SPH, For the past thirty-five years, Dr. Bernstein pioneered methods to integrate public health into emergency medicine practice, developed and disseminated systems of emergency care that enhance health communications between providers and patients, and extensively tested a comprehensive model for intervention in which physician extenders help steer patients with preventable conditions to appropriate services. He has served as a member of the MA DPH Public Health Council since 2013. During his past eleven year tenure on the DPH PHC he has contributed to deliberations on the Covid, Opioid Overdose and the Steward System Public Health Emergencies, Hospital and ED overcrowding and boarding, and the DoN process that addresses Health Equity and the Social Determinants of Health.
Dr. Bernstein has developed a body of NIH sponsored research to test the application of motivational interviewing to improving health communications and outcomes to reduce sexual risk behavior among ED patients with cocaine and heroin abuse, reduce adolescent alcohol and marijuana use, and in a 14 site Academic ED study, reduce at risk and dependent alcohol use. He also tested the Project ASSERT model, the nation’s first SAMHSA ED SBIRT program, in a trial of a brief motivational intervention delivered by peers to cocaine and heroin users. Together with Dr. Judith Bernstein, he directed the Boston University School of Public Health’s BNI-ART Institute which provided technical support and training in motivational interviewing, the peer model and system change and research design for providers in a variety of medical settings. Organizations served by the Institute include: RWJ Join Together, the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, SAMHSA, the National Institute of Drug Abuse, the Massachusetts DPH Health’s Bureau of Substance Abuse Services, NYC Department of Mental Health and Hygiene (ED SBIRT & OUCC), Howard University Medical College’s Residency SBIRT Program, and Yale New Haven Emergency Department’s Project ASSERT. Dr. Bernstein is author of 89 peer-reviewed publications and co-editor of the textbook, “Case Studies in Emergency Medicine and the Health of the Public.” He is the recipient of a number of distinguished awards among which are: The Massachusetts Medical Society: Henry Ingersoll Bowditch Award for Excellence in Public Health (1997); The BMC Jerome Klein Award for Physician Excellence (2012); The American College of Physicians, Richard and Hinda Rosenthal Award #2 (2019); and the Massachusetts Black Alcohol and Addiction Council’s 2024 Life-Time Achievement Award. He has served as a member of the MA DPH Public Health Council since 2013. During his 11 year tenure on the DPH PHC he contributed to deliberations on the Opioid Overdose and Covid Public Health Emergencies, the Steward System and Hospital and ED overcrowding and boarding crisis, and incorporation of SDOH and Health Equity in the Determination of Need (DoN) regulations.